From Noida we went to Mathura to visit the birthplace of Krishna. I was surprised when Nandan told me that the temple had been partially demolished by Muslims to replace it with a mosque. This means that all of the three favorite sites of the most popular gods – Shiv’s Kashi Vishwanath, Ram’s birthplace in Ayodhya, and Krishna’s birthplace in Mathura all have been destroyed and replaced with mosques. It is astounding how details like this escape anyone outside of the society. I have read more than most interested Western people about both the Ayodhya issue and the Vishwanath temple so I knew those issues well enough. The court ruling about Ayodhya just came a few months ago so I read about it all over again. But never had I read about the mosque on Krishna’s holy place.

There is indeed a mosque there and military with guns everywhere. During the visit one goes into a tunnel intended to give feelings of containment, and then the Krishna place of devotion is in a room to invoke the sense of being in jail just as Krishna and his parents were during his birth. I knew that Krishna escaped from the jail and was pursued by demons sent by his jailor, his evil uncle. But what I did not know from the stories was that the places of Krishna’s miracles were mostly within walking distance of his birthplace. I had assumed that Krishna and his family went into hiding after the jailbreak, but it seems that they stayed in the very neighborhood.

We went to nearby Vrindavan and stayed at the private guesthouse of the mahant of some temple. Nandan had warned me that this city was a place whose inhabitants make both of us unhappy – widows, ISKCON followers, monkeys, and pickpockets. It really is sad to see so many widows in one place, but there are some ashrams here which give them some support. Nandan’s research with Irene found them living unfairly difficult lives, and definitely they seemed to have a hard lot in life. Neither Nandan nor I care much for ISKCON people. We went to their major temple, called the “Angrej” (English) temple by locals who know quite well that ISKCON is not Indian, and it was full of out-of-towners both from Delhi and Western countries. I do not like hippies and it bothers me to have much to do with them. This was the only Hindu temple I have ever seen with a dance area but it was half-hearted non-aggressive hippie jigs. I suppose the temple has some curious features but I do not want to say anything nice about it because of my bias. Also they sell cow urine in bottles.

When we first were taking the rickshaw into the city we were near these two girls both around age 12 and I saw them pass a corner and look into an alley. One of the girls said in an exasperated tone, “Oh God, bundar! (monkey!)” There was a monkey in the middle of the alley and the girls would do well to choose another route. This was just a fleeting incident I heard during a pause while in a vehicle, but that was the first monkey I saw in town. Since the girls were in school uniforms then I assumed they must be local, and if local people voice being upset with monkeys then I assumed that monkeys must be more uncommon than Nandan had described them to be. I was wrong. Everyone in the entire city is a prisoner everywhere they go. Every window is covered in bars, every patio is enclosed within a grate, and no one carries anything small in their hands or wears glasses. Nandan had told me outlandish stories of monkeys flying into peoples faces to grab their glasses, which they would then proceed to wear while they escaped to a high place and howled at you. He told me this happened to him when he was last here. On that same rickshaw ride we were stopped from traffic and I saw a guy with glasses and it came to my mind that Nandan was exaggerating about locals not being able to wear glasses. No sooner had the thought entered my mind but from out of nowhere a monkey started charging toward the guy. The man instinctively snapped to remove his glasses and seemed freaked, then everyone nearby started laughing at him because all the prisoners here know the wardens’ rules. He was lucky only because he was in the middle of the road, in the middle of traffic, and because he had eyeglass removal reflexes. Later that night Nandan and I were at a restaurant which was also a caged fortress. It seemed so secure. During our meal there was a monkey screech in the food prep area, then a horrific set of crashes lasting longer than a set of crashes with a single initiation, then people screaming. Was this a rare occurrence or just part of life here? When we left the restaurant there I noticed a man walking down the street feeling his way around. We were walking the same way and we saw him take his glasses from his pocket, use them to look ahead, then remove and hide his glasses. People here have vision problems and their condition is caused by monkey oppression.

I had no pickpocket experience and saw nothing of the sort, but Nandan assured me that cutpurses were everywhere and out to get filthy rich and richly filthy hippies from ISKCON. He said they even bother the poor widows. Some of the widows were quite young, and I asked him if he meant that they threaten them sexually. Nandan told me that the pickpockets sometimes steal what little money the widows have, but only the monkeys rape the widows.

Leave a Reply

purpose of this blog

Follow @LaneRasberry
This is Lane Rasberry's personal blog. None of the information on this blog is private, but it is personal and I have not written it with the intent to make it of public general interest.
Anyone visiting this site has my permission to use anything they find here for friendly, share-alike purposes.